Lorna Taylor
Lorna Taylor is the President and CEO of Premier Eye Care, a leading expert in managed eye care - providing services and administration of everything from routine vision checkups to complex ocular surgical procedures.
Taylor, one of the top business leaders in Florida, was the winner in the Health & Wellness category of the 2013 Tampa Bay Business Journal’s BusinessWoman of the Year awards, while also receiving Angie’s Award, given to the finalist who best exemplified commitment to community service.
The award reflected Premier Eye Care’s far-reaching community involvement, which ranges from supporting blindness prevention to helping to empower thousands of women in Kenya.
Taylor is an accomplished leader, both in directing fast-growing Premier, and in making an impact in the community. Premier, named one of “Florida’s Best Companies To Work For” in 2013 by Florida Trend magazine, manages the routine vision and medical eye care of over 2 million insured people nationally through contracted physicians and facilities.
Personally, Taylor is involved in a wide variety of community and charitable causes. She serves on the Boards of Directors for Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute,Prevent Blindness Florida (2014 Vice Chair), Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence Foundation (2014 Chair), Tampa Bay Business for Culture and Arts (2014 Chair), and the University of Tampa Board of Trustees.She is a member of Lion’s Eye Institute for Transplant and Research and of the Beth Waters Friendship Fund.
She also serves on the advisory board of The Spring of Tampa Bay,where she is a past Chair and a recipient of the Angel Award, and was honored in 2013 as a Woman of Distinction by the Girl Scouts of West Central Florida.
In addition to these involvements and honors, Premier Eye Careis a major supporter of the International Greenbelt Movement, with Taylor serving on the organization’s international executive committee for the past seven years. The Movement’s founder, Wangari Maathai, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004 for her work, running a program where women in Kenya could grow seedlings and plant trees, helping the country’s erosion problems while making money to improve their lives and start businesses. The program, which has resulted in the planting of more than 51 million trees, has fostered the growth of democracy in Kenya while empowering thousands of women and children.
Taylor is a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary with a Master’s degree in Divinity concentrating in Social Ethics. She also attended the Hebrew University on a year-long graduate internship while completing her studies.
She lives in St. Petersburg, Fla., where she enjoys her three rescue pups, travel, art, and the vibrant cultural life of Tampa Bay.